The y-ray scintillation camera is the instrument of choice for imaging static and dynamic radioisotope distributions in vivo and provides information about functionality, morphology, and metabolic activity that is critically needed for medical diagnosis and patient management. Gamma cameras are widely used in investigation of cardiac activity and in renal function, bone and brain tumor, metastatic disease, pulmonary emboli, liver metastasis, and thyroid pathology studies. The Anger camera, which is a particular design of gamma camera, has been developed over the years since its invention in 1958. Anger camera uses a thallium doped sodium iodide scintillator to absorb the incoming y-rays (e.g. 140 keV photons from 99mTc), and an array of photomultiplier tubes (PMTs) to detect the scintillation light. The intrinsic spatial resolution of these camera designs falls in the range of 3-4 mm FWHM. While the spatial resolution obtained with the Anger cameras is dominated by the collimator design, the overall performance, size, weight, and cost of these cameras are strongly influenced by the photomultiplier tubes used. In particular, the low quantum efficiency, high cost, fragility, and bulkiness of PMTs are limiting factors in such gamma cameras. In the proposed effort, we plan to evaluate a compact gamma camera for cardiac imaging using solid-state photodetectors, which offer compact size, flexible design and high performance. A prototype camera will be built in this project and its performance will be extensively evaluated.
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